


Further Along

by DonKoogrr



Category: Naruto
Genre: Angst, Continuation of datwitchi's comic, Dark, Drabble, Imagining that this could have been Bad Blue verse, Madara's a trashfire, No happy endings, it's datwitchi's fault, like really
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-02 17:32:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 501
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17268410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DonKoogrr/pseuds/DonKoogrr
Summary: The world has never been right since Hashirama killed his brother.





	Further Along

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Let us have our dream together](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15174650) by [dahtwitchi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dahtwitchi/pseuds/dahtwitchi). 



> I'm not actually dead! 
> 
> And neither is Sugar-verse. Life just got all sorts of bullshit and every time I sat down to write I just got overwhelmed with what the story had turned into. (There are _pages_ of notes. And _arcs_. It was supposed to be fluff and angst and sex and light politics, but then people had to go and inspire me. 
> 
> As an apology for the long wait, have a short and painful drabble based on Dahtwitchi's Let us have our dream together. It's been bouncing in my head since she put it up. I hope you like it; it's rather odd stylistically but I needed to get it out there.
> 
> * * *

When Madara returns to the Uchiha compound and finds that Izuna had tricked him, had faked his death, he screams. He screams and lurches to his brother's sickbed, collapsing next to it as if possessed, his fingers pulling at his own hair, tearing out chunks of it without care.

Izuna is alive and now Madara lives in fear.

Hashirama killed _his brother_ ; if he knew that Izuna yet breathed, would he insist that Madara do the same? He doesn't know, not anymore. That boy he'd met by the river who had wept for his lost brothers is gone and there is no trace of the friend he had made that day in the man who he had agreed to make peace with. And even if this new, monstrous Hashirama didn't ask that of him, the Senju clan surely would demand it. Tobirama had died for having killed Madara's brother. Those that witnessed it had been horrified at their leader's decision and would never believe him that he hadn't known of his own little brother's survival. If they could not demand Izuna's head for the deceit, they would surely try to claim it for themselves, and the Uchiha - those that were still loyal - would retaliate and the infant village would collapse in flames.

Or maybe not, because Hashirama is apparently willing to sacrifice _his own brother-!_

When the village is suitable enough for inhabitants to begin to move in, Madara has to focus not to flinch when near his 'friend', has to block out the memory of that smiling face stained with Tobirama's blood. Tries to ignore how Izuna _wants_ to die, is _willing_ to let himself be killed. Not for the sake of the village, but because he knows Madara's terror and hates how he now lives. Blind and confined, a secret that had to be smuggled into the new Uchiha Compound; no, Izuna takes no longer takes joy from his life.

He avoids his house, his brother, his friend. He takes to haunting the aviary and skulking around the forest, trying to think of a solution to his predicament. 

Eventually, Hashirama insists that Madara help him in shaping the village and the Uchiha is too afraid to deny him. Whenever he hears the other man's laugh, Madara has to look away. He sees a friendly, _genuine_ smile and he feels nauseous. Hashirama laments over paperwork, pats Madara's back, teases him as if _nothing has changed_ and Madara wants to go home and wash the feeling of dirt from his skin.

His life is a nightmare set in what should be his ideal world. The village he and that boy had dreamed of is built on death and lies and betrayal. His brother is safe but miserable and bitter. The man who was once his closest friend is always nearby, happy and smiling and a monster.

There's a voice in his head that whispers to him to make things right.

It's only a matter of time before he asks it _how_.


End file.
